Beth reported her encounter to Donna, who was concocting a sweet-and-sour sauce in the kitchen. Donna handed the wooden spoon to a volunteer and moved to the pass-through, from which vantage she could see the entire dining room.
“On the right,” Beth said.
Donna was distracted by the sight of twenty-year-old Bitsy crooning to a stuffed animal. “Off her meds?”
“Yes. Says they addle her.”
Donna shifted her gaze to the next table and saw the new guests. They were seated side by side. The child’s hands, clasped, rested on the table. The mother’s hands lay in her lap. Each was attentive to the space in front of her eyes … to the vision of some New Jerusalem, Donna suspected.
“Adventuresses, do you think?” Beth said. “I’ll go have a chat with poor Bitsy.”
“Actresses on their lunch break,” suggested Pam, at Donna’s other shoulder. “What’s that Arthur Miller play?”
“The Crucible,” Donna said. Pam moved off.
“They’re like from another world,” said a Maeve who had replaced Beth.
And Josie had replaced Pam. “Weirdos.”
Donna didn’t reply. These newcomers were not the poor she had always with her. She was used to cheats and crazies, drunks and dealers. She was fond of little retired chambermaids whose voices still shivered with brogues; they relied on the Ladle to augment their pitiful pensions. She liked hot-tempered sisters from the South and the South Bronx; she viewed with puzzled respect magic-mongers from the islands; and she was even accustomed to certain outspoken religious zealots—shrews of Christ, Josie called them. But plain-living puritans—what were they doing in her facility?
The pair didn’t look needy. But the Ladle’s policy must hold: no prying. Among the guests were a few batty gentlewomen who might well possess million-dollar trust funds, who probably lunched at the Ritz on the days that the Ladle was closed. They were served without question. So, too, would this mother and daughter be served. It was the rule.
IN THE MONTHS THAT FOLLOWED, Donna and Beth and Pam learned a few facts about the mother and daughter, facts which they shared at the weekly staff meetings. The woman’s name was Signe. The child’s was Rhea. Signe was separated from Rhea’s father, a clergyman. Mother and daughter lived in two basement rooms just over the line in Boston. They received a monthly check from the clergyman. It met their wants. “But only barely,” Signe said to Donna. It was after lunch. The dining room was emptying out; the three were alone at a table. “We are grateful to the Ladle for our breakfasts and lunches.”
“I’m so glad. But there are other sources you could tap, too,” Donna responded. “The state government supplements inadequate incomes, and the city itself—”
“No.”
After a few minutes Donna said idly, “We sometimes hear of jobs. Tailoring work.”
“Rhea is my work.”
Donna looked at the severe little girl, who was reading a thick book. The Bible? Donna wondered. She squinted at the title.
“It was Grimm’s,” she reported later that week. “In the Modern Library edition. No pictures. Impressive.”
“Signe teaches her at home,” Beth said.
“Isn’t that against the law?”
“No,” Pam said, and then looked down at her hiking boots. She was terrified of seeming to show off.
“Tell us,” Donna said, and laughed.
Pam ran both hands through her curls. “There’s a law that even provides for home schooling, sets down regulations. But the person who teaches has to take a test, and a curriculum has to be followed, and materials … Signe would probably meet the requirements, but I doubt she’s deigned to apply.”
Signe and Rhea spent most mornings in the children’s room. Shortly before lunch they selected places at a table in the dining room. Before they ate they bowed their heads in silent prayer, and then quietly and with perfect manners dispatched whatever was set before them; then they returned to the room. There Rhea sat on a low chair beside her mother with her book, turning pages, rarely looking up.
A Maeve named Michelle—the fifth of seven children—took a sisterly interest in Rhea. She offered to play with the girl. She offered to walk with her to the park. On one occasion she offered to tell Rhea some Navajo fables. “I’m minoring in folklore,” she confided to the children’s room at large. “I’m majoring in American women. I’m writing my senior paper on Donna.”
Donna was scraping dried oatmeal from the easel. She raised her eyes. “Don’t you dare.”
“Oh, it’s almost finished,” Michelle said.
Michelle’s invitations to Rhea were always met with a polite refusal—from the child; the mother listened without comment.
“There’s a lovely pulpit upstairs,” Michelle said one morning. “Should we have a look at it together?”
“No, thank you.”
“Wouldn’t you like to see my dormitory? It’s just a few blocks away.”
“No, thank you.”
Donna had to take Michelle aside. “I think perhaps—if you’re just nearby, like an old tree, she’ll eventually come to you.”
“She’s so lonely,” Michelle wailed.
“Little Cassandra would love to build a block tower.”
“Cassandra’s no challenge.”
“Yes, well, but,” murmured Donna. “Okay?”
When Rhea did play she played by herself: arranged the doll-house or drew elaborate diagrams that looked like plans for lace tablecloths. Meanwhile Signe actually did crochet, her hands and hook converting a ball of wheat-colored thread into a long, loose fabric. The ball of thread lay in a canvas sack, and since the fabric she made dropped slowly into the sack, too, none of the staff knew whether Signe was making afghan strips or dresser scarves or just yards of trimmings. The woman was as silent and as absorbed as her daughter. Once in a while, though, when one of the toddlers became difficult, she would put down her crocheting, rise from the chair, and pick up the whining or bawling or flailing child. The child grew instantly quiet, either borrowing Signe’s composure or becoming paralyzed with terror. After a few minutes Signe set the youngster down and returned to her work, her scar glistening like the trail of a tear.
THE WINTER WORE ON. There were two fistfights. There was a fight with knives; the police had to be called. Concepta was caught drinking in the bathroom and was barred for a week. An elderly guest was found dead in her rented room. Another was found almost dead in an alley. Pam began to lead after-lunch discussions on subjects like self-esteem and expectations. Cassandra and her mother stopped coming to the Ladle. Over dessert one afternoon Donna wondered aloud what had become of them. Her table erupted with answers.
“They went south.”
“They went to New York.”
“The gran took them back.”
“She married that son of a bitch.”
Donna was impressed by this group confabulation. She lit a rare cigarette. Cassandra and her mother would return. Or else they would not.
“But all those explanations can’t be true,” Michelle said to Donna as she took away the dishes.
“Sure they can. Seriatim. Anyway, it’s not our business, toots.”
“Whose business is it?”
“The parole officer’s. You’ve got to take some things as you find them, Michelle.”
Michelle wheeled furiously away. She deposited her stack of dishes in the pass-through. Noisily scraping a chair, she sat down beside a guest who had once practiced law. Donna heard the girl enthusiastically propose that the former lawyer write down some of her experiences. The delighted guest understood this as an invitation to dictate her autobiography. “I am born,” she began.
Donna considered rescuing her acolyte, thought better of it, took refuge in the children’s room. Within a few minutes she was sitting cross-legged on the floor. Ricky Mendozo was sniffling in her lap. Nathaniel and Elijah were lining up trucks, squabbling lightly. Bitsy lounged in the doorway, a teddy bear under her arm.
&n
bsp; “The sauce on the fish was funny today,” Bitsy said. “Did you make it, Donna?”
“Josie made it.”
“The volunteer that looks like a parrot?”
“She has red hair and dresses colorfully,” Donna sidestepped.
“What’s in that sauce, huh?”
“Yogurt and mayonnaise.”
“Where’s my Nathaniel!” said Nathaniel’s mother, bursting past Bitsy.
“I prefer lemon butter,” said Bitsy.
“You, Nathaniel. Ain’t you ready?”
Nathaniel ran toward Donna. Ricky, still in Donna’s lap, gave him a feeble kick. Nathaniel yelled and punched Ricky. Nathaniel’s mother slapped Nathaniel. Elijah threw a truck at Bitsy.
The trouble swirled and then settled. Donna got help from Michelle, who thereby escaped from the lawyer’s reminiscences. By three o’clock most of the children and their mothers had been bundled out. Beth and some volunteers were putting the kitchen to rights. Michelle was singing to Africa. Pam was managing to calm Elijah’s gorgeous turquoise-eyed mother, who claimed that her social worker had recommended prostitution as a career. Donna was mopping the dining room.
“Good-bye,” said a low voice: Signe’s. She was carrying her sack and several books. Rhea too had books within each elbow. Their capes, widened by their burdens, looked like bat wings.
Many guests made use of the public library. Free toilets, a choice of periodicals, chairs to snooze in. But Signe and Rhea actually borrowed and returned books. They patronized the museum, too; a volunteer had spotted them at a lecture on Dutch Interiors. And Pam had once seen them at the statehouse, listening to a debate on the budget. Those events were probably part of Rhea’s schooling. They were fine arts and social studies field trips, just like the ones taken by schoolchildren, but uncomplicated by questions of who would sit next to whom on the bus. Rhea would end up better educated than her cohorts. “She’ll get into Harvard,” Pam had predicted. “That’s more than I did.” But Donna thought that the girl would be better off in a classroom, learning to tolerate and interact and share. Schools weren’t meant only for the likable. There must be a place for this scarily self-possessed miniature of her mother. Let Signe crochet in the corridor if the two couldn’t bear separation. Let them practice their queer habits somewhere else.
“Good-bye,” Donna said.
She watched them go. She leaned on her mop, letting her distaste for the pair flood her cheeks. The motherly slaps and threats and insults she countenanced every day at the Ladle didn’t bother her as much as Signe’s austere silence. She wondered if Signe controlled her girl by means of some drug undreamed of by the street-smart clientele of the Ladle—brimstone, maybe, bubbling on the stove in their basement apartment.
“Am I glad them two is gone,” Africa’s aunt said, finally coming out of the john. She tied Africa’s knitted hat so tightly that the child’s face bulged beneath it.
“Which two?”
“Which two? The devil and her child. They give me the creeps. And is you the cutest cookie God ever made?” she inquired of Africa, who burbled something in return.
“Isn’t the devil a man, Ollie?”
“He can put on a dress, honey. Do you happen to have an extra buck or two? Pampers is so expensive.”
Pampers were indeed expensive. They were regularly stolen from stores and resold on the street; the entrepreneurs involved made a tidy supplemental income. Donna gave Ollie both money and Pampers, and was rewarded by a mammoth embrace that made her grin—it was so easy, so emphatic, so momentarily sincere, so ultimately meaningless.
“Hug me again,” Donna demanded.
Ollie complied. Then: “How about another Pamper?”
Donna gave her the rest of the box. Ollie and Africa jounced away. “You’re the devil,” Donna called after them, laughing. As for Signe—she was merely a visitor from a strict, drear world.
Donna turned her thoughts to current problems. The Helping Hands had dropped the Ladle in favor of animal rights. The Maeves’ attendance had slackened, though Michelle remained faithful. The price of vegetables was going up; even broccoli was almost out of sight. Mice were running free in the pantry. Tomorrow, Thursday, might be a nightmare. Pam was to lead an after-lunch discussion of empowerment, and who knew what would ensue? Last month the empowerment session had ended in disarray: the former lawyer had lengthily cited cases; Bitsy, in disgust, had poured iced tea down a new guest’s back. Perhaps tomorrow’s meeting would be more orderly. A representative from the governor’s office had promised to drop in. Donna hoped he wouldn’t get the iced tea.
IN FACT, THE EMPOWERMENT discussion went well. The guests who attended drafted a petition protesting budget cuts. Bitsy caused no trouble: she stayed in the children’s room with Michelle and Elijah. In the dining room Elijah’s mother sat next to the governor’s representative and with judicious obscenity explained exactly how this state had failed her. A knapsack containing all her belongings lay on the table in front of her; she punched it for emphasis. The governor’s representative jotted down some notes, but mostly he stared hungrily at Elijah’s beautiful mother—at her glossy hair, braided like an Indian bride’s; at her ivory skin; at her long blue-green eyes.
Toward the end of the discussion Donna saw the supermarket’s boy trundle in a case of young asparagus, as mauve as a rabbit’s nose. “Donation!” he yelled. The pantry mice, she’d noticed, had swallowed all their poison. They must be back behind the walls, dying.
AND NOW IT WAS Friday afternoon. Free Food had just delivered several baskets of very soft tomatoes. The staff would stew them as soon as possible. Pam and Donna were separating the merely over-ripe from the absolutely rotten.
“I got a glimpse of Signe’s handiwork the other day,” Pam said.
“What’s it like?”
“Like nothing I’ve ever seen. It’s a hollow coil that seems to turn inside out every so often. I can’t imagine its purpose.”
“A noose, maybe?”
Pam shuddered. “She probably rips it out every night, like what’s her name.”
“Penelope. But Signe does make their clothing. She can do useful needlework.”
“Maybe the coil is her hobby,” Pam said. “Ugh,” she added, as a tomato imploded on her palm.
Most of the guests had left. The staff and the volunteers mopped the floors and cleaned the kitchen and stacked chairs and tables. Michelle, on her way to a weekend with her boyfriend, ran by—a toothy smile, a pair of fast denimed legs. “Oh, Donna, I forgot to put away the cleaning bucket in the children’s room. Have to catch the bus. Sorree!”
Donna waved her on and went into the empty children’s room to fetch the bucket.
But the children’s room wasn’t empty. Signe and Rhea sat on their low chairs, facing each other. They were reciting something in words Donna couldn’t catch—a tuneless but emotional song consisting of questions and responses. Signe intoned the questions. Rhea declared the responses. The child’s eyes were closed, her sparse lashes long on her unmarked cheeks. Signe’s eyes were open, watching the girl with consuming interest. “You can’t—,” Donna began, lurching forward, banging her shin on Michelle’s pail.
Rhea opened her eyes. Both Signe and Rhea turned to look at Donna, who was standing on one leg now, rubbing the other. We can’t what? they seemed to be inquiring. What rule were they breaking? They were not drinking. They were not doping. They were not yelling. They were not striking each other. The tone of their liturgy was charged but it wasn’t abusive. How was Donna to finish her admonition—you can’t look peculiar? You can’t try to save your child from corruption? You can’t pray?
“Sorry,” she muttered. Limping, she pushed the wheeled pail out of the room. The harsh duet resumed. Rhea’s words sounded like numbers. Perhaps she was reciting the populations of the world’s capitals. Perhaps she was calculating square roots.
Whatever her catechism, it was soon over. Mother and daughter emerged, now in their capes, while Donn
a was putting away a stack of newly washed tablecloths. At the same moment a small figure with half a dozen arms and legs whirled into the dining room from the area of the bathroom, capturing the attention of all three. It was Elijah, in flight. He scooted diagonally across the empty dining room, a pinwheel shooting sparks. Then his mother ran in, too, her now unbraided satin hair streaming over her knapsack, a hunch-backed bird. “I’m going to get you!”
There was a swoop. The pinwheel was caught. His captor, however, was not the raven but the bat: Signe. She held him high, above her upturned face. He grinned down at her. Her cape hung in a column behind her. Elijah’s mother skidded to a stop.
“My baby!” she demanded.
Rhea joined them.
“I a plane!” Elijah shouted, flapping his elbows. “Donna, I a plane!”
Rhea lifted her arms in imitation of her mother. Elijah’s mother lifted her arms, too. “My baby,” she said, in a softer voice. Signe placed Elijah in the girdle formed by Rhea’s hands. Rhea held the child aloft for a moment, then passed him to his mother. She, too, held him for a moment, like a chalice, before settling him onto her shoulder and marching out.
Signe adjusted her cape. Then she turned to her daughter. They exchanged a long, silent stare—a gaze of peace and intimacy and intricately tangled pleasure. The space between them became briefly radiant. Donna, though blistered, watched. She wondered whether she would ever again pay honor to that meager virtue getting-along-with-people. She knew that she would never again claim to understand anything about mothers and children.
They left. Donna walked into the kitchen. It would be a pleasure to stew tomatoes until they burst through their skins.
HOME SCHOOLING
NAUSEATED, DIZZY, I LAY on the backseat of our dusty car, my head resting against the garment bag that held my father’s two tuxedos. Beyond my raised knees I saw a mortar sky. Above the front seat rose my Aunt Kate’s ponytailed head and shoulders, and my twin sister Willy’s head, or at least the top of her baseball cap. Willy kept fiddling with the radio and singing French songs we’d learned from our parents. “Yaagh,” I said every so often.
Binocular Vision: New & Selected Stories Page 22